Pastor's Reflection

Sometimes you just happen to be in the right place at the right
time - and you get to witness for yourself something pretty
remarkable.

I was sitting on the Ocean City, NJ boardwalk a couple of weeks
ago. It was around 9 p.m. And before you ask, yes, I was sitting
there eating my favorite mint & chocolate cone from Kohr's.
When in Ocean City, it's a must.

A rather "different" gentleman who was perhaps 30-35 years of
age, complete with a Santa Claus-type beard stopped not too far
from us and put a poster and some markers down on the boardwalk.
Then he took a very unprofessional-looking sign out of his bag and
he stood there on the boardwalk holding up a sign that said, "Ask
me to rap."

Of course, I get mesmerized with things like this. I just had
to stay put on that bench until I figured out what was going
on.

In just another minute or two, a group of 5 young people,
perhaps 13-14 years old, came up and mentioned that today was one
of their birthdays and asked if he could rap about that. He said,
"no, I only do my own songs." They said, "okay then, rap for us."
With that, the man began a very animated rap song about the way
Christ had saved his life. I remember the closing line, "Don't let
Satan win!" And then he flipped the sign over and it read, "Jesus
Saves".

Well, I guess I expected all five of the young people to either
walk away, or at the very least to start rolling their eyes at one
another. But that's not what happened. They stood there
attentively. Then they put a few dollars in his basket, he handed
them a CD of his music, and he asked them to kneel down and write
something on the poster if they felt they wanted to give their life
to Christ tonight. Which they all did - one by one.

Not long after that, another group of young people stopped and
what happened was almost identical - they listened and then they
knelt down on the boardwalk and wrote on the poster.

I just couldn't help myself. I walked up to the man and told
him I was a Methodist minister and I was so excited by what I was
seeing. I asked if he would rap for me and if I could video him. He
said, "Sure!" When he was done, I thanked him for sharing his love
for Christ with young people.

Well, needless to say, I was blown away that night. I suppose
it just goes to show you - Christ uses all kinds of different
people to share the Gospel in all kinds of different ways.